THE SPREAD OF CHOLERA.

Dunstan Times, Issue 1233, 16 October 1885, Page 3

THE SPREAD OF CHOLERA.

The exheme and daily increasing fatality attending the spread of the cholera in Spain, where it haa already, says the Home News of the 24’h August, numbered more than 100,000 cases, of which some 50,000 have proved fatal, and the extension of the disease to the souih of France cannot be regarded with unconcern in this country, not only by the prospective tourists who will naturally and wisely object to travel in infected lauds, and who will shun the shores of the Mediterranean this year as they did in that which is passed, bat also by those who are anxious respecting the safety of onr own country and its prospect of nnmui nity from the scourge. The prevalence of cholera in those pans of the Continent bordering the Mediterranean may be accounted for by two sets of conditions, firstly, the extreme heat of the climate, and, secondly, the eminently unsanitary conditions of the dwellings of the people. Of these two the latter is decidedly the most potent. Cholera is of all epidemics that which depends most surely on defective drainage, and its inevitable concomitant, impure drinking water. In Naples, where the disease raged with extraordinary severity during the past year, the water sappy was foetid, and the dwellings of a large portion of the people little better than cesspools and open sewers ; the result was that when the cholera did appear its victims weie numbered by thousands. In Spain the habits of the working people in most parts, as regards drainage and sewerage, can only I e described as filthy in the extreme. Consequently, the drink hj g water becomes contaminated, and then the disease runs riot. However much we may grumble .at the condition of things in Loudoh, and in England generally, there'is no doubt that the metropolis is the most sanitary of all the large cities in the world. Those who travel know that the faint sickly smell of sewer gas which is common in the majority of the hotels and many of the private hoteis abroad would not for a day bo tolerated in a well regulated English mansion, and whilst our atmospheric surroun 1inga are superior, our water supply is above all comparison with that which exeats in the majority of Continental cities. That the disease will extend to other places iu the soulii of France there is muck reason to believe ; its presence in Marseilles is easily to be accounte I for by the exceedingly unsatis factory sanitary arrangements of the city and the return of the troops from Tonqu.u, suffering, as manv are, with the worst forms of typhoid and other low fevers. It is not improbable that the cholera may extend to England ; in fact, there are few seasons in which a small imm'ier of cases of the true Asiatic type do not occur ; but the outlook is not one which should excite panic or alarm, but only induce us to examine well into the sanitary condition of our houses, A private letter quilted by the Madrid correspondent of the ‘Daily News’ gives the following details of the spread of the plague in Granada :—“ You cannot imagine what we. have pissed through in the last five weeks. Official and Press accounts fall short of I he horrible reality which has come to a climax. Paring the whole of the week there was 350 cases, and from 200 to 250 deaths daily. In some of the streets 100 persons have been attacked in a single day - every occupant on some floors. Some tiuus everybody in a house lias been carried off by cholera. At first the authorities enforced burials at night, but then they had to lot the bodies be conveyed at all hours in carts and carriages, coffinlcsa in many cases to the cemeteries, where soldiers and convicts were told off as gravediggers. The doctors and priests did not suffice for the ince-saut calls of the lower classes, who passed from despondency of tits of violent rage, particularly against the medical men, but us the plague increased composure an t resignation came. The authorities of tha ■garrison, the archbishop, the priest, ail rivalled each other iu their noble efforts, many perishing at their post like our prelate. The fuuos for provisions and medical resources are insufficient, and the city of Or mada and the province call for a visit of a member of the Government and the aid of charity. The plague has swept off 5000 victims, half of them iu Granada alone, so soon after the earthquakes. The King has twice sent a subscription of L2OJ.”